Strategy and Fighting the Fewest Battles

Nothing will have a bigger impact on a contractors business over the next decade than putting in a very rigorous process for strategy development and execution.

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The industry is changing rapidly due to technology, a massive shortage of management talent as well as major trends in project delivery and geographic expansion.  

Leadership Tools: Strategic Planning. A General does not plan how to win every battle; they plan how few battles they need to fight to win the war.

Strategic decisions along with the operating rhythms and the feedback mechanisms that ensure execution are the most highly leveraged decisions in the business. 

This is an area where an experienced 3rd party can add significant value.  Find someone that resonates with your team and has experience relevant to your company.  Change the facilitator every few years for fresh ideas. Unless they are really bad don’t change them every year so you have some continuity.  You might consider overlapping facilitators having the outgoing facilitator sit in on your side of the table providing additional continuity.  

Consider bringing in some of your key customers, vendors and subcontractors as part of your strategic planning process.  Whatever you do; don’t underestimate the value of this process.   

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Premature Optimization
Construction technology innovation has exploded and is continuing to accelerate. The quantity of experienced talent is at a low point and will continue to decline throughout the next 10+ years. There are probably more unknowns than knowns.
Our Principles for Creating Value in Careers, Projects, and Contracting
“As to methods, there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The person who grasps principles can successfully select their own methods. The person who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.” - Harrington Emmerson
Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act (The OODA Loop)
The OODA Loop is a decision-making framework originally developed for the military to make agility a competitive advantage. The focus on fast, localized decisions in rapidly changing environments aligns well with construction projects and businesses.